Ok, so I’m going to go there. Yes, that’s right. I’m heading into Sarah Palin babygate territory. Yes, I ignored the Todd Palin hooker story, because frankly Todd Palin’s sexual issues aren’t of any interest to me. Sure, it could be made political for a variety of legitimate reasons (family values, he ran the show in Alaska, Christian values, etc) but as a woman, I just don’t think it’s applicable to Sarah Palin as a political candidate.

But there’s one issue that is applicable to Palin as a politician and a Christian leader, and that is her relationship with her feti. Long before Palin was chosen by McCain in 2008, rumors were swirling around Alaska about her fifth pregnancy. A lot of people questioned her claims because she didn’t appear pregnant and because she had kept it secret for a long time. For me, the issue always came down to her “wild ride” – the plane ride she claims to have taken home from a speaking engagement in Texas after leaking amniotic fluid before her speech.

I just don’t know any woman who would take a ten hour plane ride involving a layover from Texas to Alaska hours after they had already broken water, especially not while carrying an at risk baby who was premature. No matter how many times I looked into this story, there was never a satisfactory answer from Palin. She claims she was in labor, then not in labor just broke water. She claims she wasn’t in pain. People who saw her had no idea she was pregnant. But she gave birth hours after landing.

The story goes on and on with odd details like Todd driving Sarah past the hospital with a neo-natal unit to get to a hospital that does not specialize in premature deliveries, where she ultimately gave birth to Trig Palin, her fifth son.

But it just seems too much to think that a woman would fake a pregnancy, doesn’t it? I don’t want to believe this story. There are plenty of things about Palin politically that stand on their own merit. And so I’ve left this story alone.

But today we have an interview with the woman who claims to have had sex with Todd Palin multiple times between 2007 and 2009 in which she discusses giving Sarah Palin a massage months before she “delivered.” According to her, there were no indications that Palin was pregnant and worse, Palin had received many treatments at the spa where the woman was working and filled out paperwork asking if she were pregnant. The woman, Shailey Tripp, claims that Palin never told anyone at the spa that she was pregnant. How odd.

If this is true, and we haven’t seen any of the back up evidence to prove any of it, it suggests that Sarah Palin was either reckless with her pregnancy or not pregnant, yet again. If this story has any truth to it at all, Sarah Palin is going to have a lot of explaining to do. She is, after all, a pro-life favorite candidate.

Shailey Tripp was named in a recent National Enquirer story as the “prostitute” who had an affair with Todd Palin. If you listen to Shailey, she simply doesn’t sound like someone who is lying and I know how much it will cost her to have come out against the Palins in this way. There are many possible reasons why she could be lying including financial gain, celebrity, or even blackmail, but neither the NE nor the police responding to her accusations have said anything about a personal motive. The police did deny that Todd was involved in a prostitution sting, for whatever that’s worth since it’s not what the NE accused him of being involved in.

When asked when the massage took place, Shailey estimates in February of 2008 (Trig was born in April of 2008) but says it was definitely between January and March of 2008.

She explains further the state of Pain’s body at the time, “Yeah, because she was, she was really tender. But her stomach wasn’t rounded or firm and there was no movement in her stomach at all to indicate that there was a baby in there. And I really…I was really, really shocked when she announced that she had had a baby a few months later. ” Shailey goes on to discuss the hurt and shock of the entire office upon learning that Sarah Palin was pregnant. “Probably more a feeling of a state of shock but also afraid that they could have hurt her or the baby.”

If Shailey Tripp were the only person saying that Sarah Palin denied she was pregnant or didn’t appear pregnant in 2008, there would be no story here. After all, I’m sorry to say it will be easy to discredit Tripp with her arrest. Of course, she must know this. She does, after all, live in Alaska. But Shailey Tripp isn’t alone in her accusation. There was the Alaskan Airlines response that Palin didn’t appear pregnant during her flight (during which she was supposedly in labor). That’s beyond odd. Who doesn’t appear pregnant while in labor? What kind of person choses to fly while leaking amniotic fluid and then doesn’t even alert the airlines to her condition in case there is a medical emergency?

In case you think this is all a crazy conspiracy theory, check out this video, the Spouses’s Lunch hosted by Gov. Palin on March 29, 2008 at the Governor’s Mansion in Juneau, AK (from which the screengrab was taken). Palin gave birth three weeks after this video and yet she does not appear to be pregnant in this video at all. This adds some credence to Shailey Tripp’s allegations that no one knew she was pregnant and she didn’t appear pregnant.

Why did Sarah Palin say she wasn’t pregnant in early 2008 when she gave birth just months later? Why would this self-proclaimed championed of the unborn lie about her pregnancy just so she could get the deluxe package at the spa? What does this say about how much Sarah Palin truly values the life of the unborn much less the potential health risks that her reckless behavior presented to the child that she was carrying?

Given her position as an anti-choice candidate, her behavior was odd. Carried to the extreme anti-choicers value the life of the fetus more than the life of the mother, therefore, it’s legitimate politically to question Sarah Palin regarding why she chose to lie to the spa about her pregnancy in order to engage in services that could have harmed her unborn child. It is even more than legitimate, it’s necessary in the face of Palin’s belief system that she wants to impose upon others.

Politically this latest account adds to the questions surrounding her pregnancy, and if Sarah Palin is going to be a presidential candidate in 2012, she had better be prepared to step up give a satisfactory answer about her poor judgment regarding her care of her unborn child. Her standard victimization and Mama Grizzly protecting her cubs defenses are not going to cut it.